


Whispers in the Desert

by yoopersundevil



Series: Whispers in the Desert [1]
Category: Original Work
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Urban Fantasy, F/F, F/M, M/M, POV Multiple, phoenix arizona
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-08-28
Updated: 2018-09-07
Packaged: 2019-07-03 20:26:58
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 7,929
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15826326
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yoopersundevil/pseuds/yoopersundevil
Summary: In 1945, a disaster in World War II Japan pushed the magical world into the public eye. By the time 2018 rolls around, magic and science have grown side by side to create a new world.As the magical world prepares for a monumental peace treaty between two antagonistic magical Houses, an old foe threatens to show its face and plunge humanity into a new war.





	1. Theo 1

“Is that a Carthage magician?” 

The words draw my attention up from my book. Amie sits next to me, her notebook already open in front of her, but she stares at a young man on the far side of the small lecture hall. 

I spot the person she is talking about. It is not hard, considering the short silver hair stands out against the menagerie of hair colors of the other students. The man it belongs to is tall, and although he does not look Latino, he has caramel skin. He wears a set of high-end headphones on. A couple of the other students try to make conversation, but they soon give up, moving to other groups to chat with. 

“Who is that?” I ask, my voice just enough to be heard over the din of the other students. 

Amie leans back in her seat. “Hm… I think that that’s Rik Redgrave.” 

“Redgrave? I thought that the family only had one member.” 

She shrugs. “Yeah, there’s only one member belonging to the bloodline, but I think that Rik’s an adopted child. He’s the heir, even though he’s not related to the founder.” 

The door to the classroom opens, and a man walks in. He uses an elegantly carved wooden cane to walk with, and he moves smoothly despite his disability. He has short, dark brown hair and pale skin, and while his face wears a mask of indifferent exhaustion, his clothes appear to be well-cared for. 

The man sets his cane against the edge of the table at the front of the room. “Alright. Sit down. We don’t have all day,” the man says. It takes a minute or so before everyone has taken their seats. “Alright. Now that we’re all set, let’s begin.” 

“Oh. My. Gosh,” Amie whispers. “That’s Damian Redgrave. This is too much.” 

He looks over the room. “This is MTC101, Introduction to Magitech Engineering. I suppose you either here to learn about magitech engineering or some more advanced spellcrafting techniques.” He sighs. “I hope that none of you are expecting this to be an easy course. I was asked to teach this class, and I’m doing this as a favor for a friend, but I expect that all of you will be able to utilize the advanced techniques I teach to become better magicians in the future.” 

I hear a couple of students near me grumble at the comment, but I find myself leaning forward. My chest is tight, breathing becomes difficult, and my vision dims. I struggle to draw in a breath, and for once, I’m thankful that we are at the back of the room where no one can see me. 

I feel a touch on my arm. I blink, my vision clearing, and I find myself staring into Amie’s eyes. “Hey. Settle down. I’m here with ya,” she says. “You and me. I’ll be your power.” 

I swallow. My throat feels tight. I force the spit down despite the tightness, and I manage to nod my head. She gives me a faint smile and sits back. 

Redgrave frowns as he looks over the other students. He reaches up to scratch the back of his head. He taps the cover of a book lying on the table. It looks like a dictionary of some sort, but I’m too far away to “I’m not going to go easy on you in this class, but I need to know where all of you guys stand, so here’s your first assignment: by the end of class, craft a spell to move this book a distance of ten feet and execute it. I don’t care if you work together or on your own. Just move it ten feet, and you get a passing grade for the assignment.” He picks up the book and drops it onto the floor with a loud clap. He walks out ten feet and draws a line in white chalk on the concrete floor. 

I frown. Amie taps her finger against the desk. “Hm… Alright. You and me, right, Theo?” 

I nod. Amie pulls her chair closer to me. I get my notebook out and open it to the first blank page. A spell has a few major parts. The most important parts of a spell are means and results. What the spell hopes to accomplish and how it means to make that happen. Some spells have specific targets built into the spell itself, but most are more generalized, allowing for their widespread use. Others have more elaborate means or more extravagant results, and that increases the length, difficulty, or cost of the spell. The most common spells have been refined to the point of being able to be casted with a single word. 

The result is easy. Move a book ten feet. 

The issue is the means. I don’t know how much the book weighs. I don’t know how rough the cover is or how rough the floor is. I don’t know how much force I need to put into the spell’s means, especially since I don’t want it to cost too much for Amie to execute. 

“How about this?” I ask, scribbling down a quick, three-line spell, guessing at some of the variables. It is a little more specific than most, but I hope that by designating a target, it would reduce the costs of the means to accomplice the results. 

Amie looks over the spell. She reads over the spell in silence, and then she nods. “Looks good.” 

She takes the page to Damian Redgrave. He looks it over. “That was fast,” he says. He passes the page next to her. “Alright, let’s see what you can do.” 

The students near me stop working on their own spells to watch Amie. She pulls out a glove with two fingers missing and puts it on. I recognize the glove as her Focus, the sign that she is a journeyman-level magician. The Focus allows her to guide her magic into the spell as long as she focuses on the instructions of the makeshift spell. 

The Focus gives off a faint glow as she prepares. I hold my breath. The book shudders once and then slides across the floor in one smooth motion. It crosses the line, smearing the chalk slightly. Redgrave watches it emotionlessly. “Good job. So Theodore Fletcher and Amie Escher get a passing grade,” he says, taking a note into his notebook. “Take your seat.” 

As Amie climbs the small flight of stairs back up to the top row, I spot a couple of male magicians turned in their seats. I don’t recognize them, so they must not be from one of the local schools. They are wearing uniforms of a branch family of House Neumann, but I don’t think that even Amie would know which of the many Neumann branch families they belong to. The taller of the pair notice me staring and pulls his buddy around. 

“What’s up?” Amie asks as she sits down. 

I lean back in the chair. “Nothing.” I look at Redgrave as he picks up the book and returns it to the starting position. “How did the spell work?” 

She grins. “Excellently. It wasn’t particularly hard or heavy. There was a moment that it had trouble getting going, but then it moved easily.” She stretches her arms over her head. “That was easier than I expected though.” 

We watch as the other students, most working alone, finish crafting their spells and use them to move the book. Redgrave watches them with indifferent eyes, not showing any real reaction when they finish the assignment. Rik manages the task with ease, while the two Neumann relatives just barely manage to get the book over the line. They glare at me as they sit back down. 

The rest of my classes spend the first day going over the syllabi, and for the most part, I find myself reading the first chapter of the magitech textbook through those classes. 

The idea behind magitech is the combination of magic and technology to enhance the lives of both magicians and humans. It’s a relatively newer field, coming into existence shortly after the Tokyo Disaster of 1944 and only really reaching a practical level within the past 20 years. While there are some experts, most of the field is still just theory and propositions. 

It’s a field ripe with potential. I hope to carve my place in it, make a name for myself as an expert in the field. 

I find myself reading ahead, and by the end of the night, I finish reading through to the end of chapter 4. Even after I put the book down, my mind still chases after ideas, and it takes a couple of hours to finally fall asleep. 

I wake early. My body aches with exhaustion, and for once, I’m thankful that I’m not a magician. I can hear my father complaining already as I climb down the stairs. My mother mutters some generic platitude, and I can smell maple syrup coming from the kitchen. My stomach growls at the sweet smell. 

My father looks up as I come into the room. “Look who’s come out of his room,” he says. A cup of coffee sits in front of him. A plate with a pair of pancakes sits untouched next to the cup. 

I ignore him, moving to the cabinet to grab my own plate. “Leave him alone. He’s busy studying,” Mother says. I fish a pair of pancakes from the plate of finished pancakes. 

Father leans back. “What could he have to study?” 

The conversation continues, but I focus on my food. The pancakes are drier than I would like, but otherwise they are fine. I eat quickly and retreat to my room. I finish getting ready for the day and am out of the house less than an hour after waking up. I take the light rail to campus, getting off at the station at Rural and University. 

I spot Damian and Rik standing near the entrance to the PSA building. They stand close, with their heads even closer, and I can’t tell what they are doing. They are wearing rather nice business suits, rather than the more casual clothing from yesterday, and I find myself staring at Rik more than I expected. I tear my eyes away before he notices me. I go down Palm Walk and turn right at the road to go to the Memorial Union. I climb down the stairs that leads to the large bank of televisions. Half of the televisions are off, a field of static, and the rest show a couple of morning shows. A person sleeps, sprawled across a couple of seats. 

Amie is already sitting at one of the tables on the lower level. She has her laptop open, and her attention is focused solely on whatever is on the screen. She notices my approach and looks up. She waves at me, even though I’m already heading towards her. I pull a chair out and take a seat on the other side of the table from her. 

“How’s the day been treating you?” she asks. 

“Same shit. Different day,” I say. I look through my bag and frown when I realize that I didn’t stop to get any caffeine on the way into campus. I sigh, allowing my eyes to fall closed. “Hopefully the day goes quickly.” 

She laughs. “That bad, huh?” She leans back in her chair, tapping her hands against the tabletop. “Did you hear? Houses Dreyfus and Rasputin have agreed to sign a peace treaty, and Phoenix is where it’s supposed to happen.” 

I open one eye and look at her. “Really? Those two have been at war for nearly 100 years. What brought this on?” 

“Dreyfus proposed it, especially with the failing health of its head,” Amie says, typing into the laptop. “It was a bit surprising, sure, but I think that a lot of people see it as long overdue. It’ll be interesting to see what happens from now on.” 

We spend an hour preparing for the day. While yesterday had every class, today only has a couple of classes. For me, those classes are Intro to Magitech and Calculus 1. I end up trying to read through the first chapter of the calculus textbook. I tap a pen against the tabletop, listening to the tap-tap-tap of the point moving in and out of the cylinder. 

My phone rings, drawing my attention away from the textbook and the pen. I reach over and frown at the name on the screen. It’s one of my contacts, changing the caller from the number to the name Ben, though he doesn’t have a picture like the rest of my contacts. 

I answer the call. “Hello?” 

“Theo, what are you up to right now?” 

_Has he always sounded like that?_

Amie looks at me, a question in her eyes, but she doesn’t say anything. I wave her away before I get to my feet and take a couple of steps away. “I’m getting ready for school. What’s going on?” 

“Ah, I am in town for business so I was hoping to meet up with you. Where are you?” 

I glance at Amie. “Sorry. My day is completely full.” 

“That’s too bad,” Ben says, though he doesn’t sound too worried. “Well, I heard that Aksel and Clara are coming back from their trip today. I’m sure that you are excited.” 

The words cause me to perk up. The Lindhardt twins had been overseas for the past year, doing something or other for their father, and while we had tried to stay in touch, preparing for college had taken up most of my time. 

I didn’t think that my brother was close to anyone in House Lindhardt, though. 

Ben’s voice comes over the phone, but it’s muted as if he’s turned away from his phone to talk to someone, and I can’t really hear what he’s saying. I wait until he finishes before I continue. “Since when have you been good friends with the Lindhardts?” 

“I have a couple of coworkers who are close to them, so I came to have connections of my own.” He sighs. “I’ve got to get going. I’ll try to stop at home before I head out again, but I can’t promise anything.” 

We say our goodbyes and end the call. I shove the phone back into my pocket as I sit back down. Amie leans over. “What was that about?” 

“It was Ben.” 

“Ben? Like your brother? Like the brother who was gone in the middle of nowhere most of the time? That Ben?” I nod. “What did he have to say?” 

“He said that Clara and Aksel were coming back.” 

She blinks, stunned into silence. It takes a couple of seconds before she can gather her thoughts enough to speak. “Ah! So the Four Musketeers will be back together then,” she says. She leans to one side against the edge of the table. “It’s a good thing then. I wonder if they’ll be taking classes with us.” 

A series of chimes starts, coming from a speaker nearby. It continues for a few seconds and rings out nine times. “We should get going.” 

We pack up our stuff and head out. We walk up the path between the Hayden Library and the power plant to the Life Sciences tower. The door to the classroom is just inside the main doors of the tower, and we take seats at the back of the room. 

There are few others in the class so early, and a couple of them dozed in their seats. I spot the two Neumann relatives at the front of the room, but they don’t seem to have noticed our presence. I sigh, feeling a strange sense of relief. I pull out my notebook and pens. 

The door opens, and Rik comes into the room. He is still wearing the business suit and looks rather suave in it. His silver hair is combed back and glistens slightly in the bright lights of the room. He walks to the front corner of the room and sits down. 

The Neumann relatives lean close together. I can see that they are talking to each other and looking at Rik. My eyes narrow; they can’t be up to anything good. 

Shortly before the start of the class, Redgrave enters the room. He is also wearing a business suit, but it has lost its cleanliness. It has an air of laziness, but I’ve come to decide that the aura is more of Redgrave’s fault than the suit’s. “Alright. Sit down,” he says. He waits until the students sit down before continuing. “Alright, so now that I’ve seen everyone’s current skill, we can get started on training.” 

He begins a lecture, covering the basics of spell-crafting and going over a few of the more advanced techniques in only the slightest of details, though he promises that the techniques will be covered at a later date. 

The lecture ends with 15 minutes to spare, which Redgrave uses for another practical assignment. He pulls out a small plastic bottle of water and puts it on the table. “Alright. Let’s put these techniques into practice. Adjust the {Freeze} spell to freeze a bottle of water in it without freezing the water inside. I want a frozen bottle, not a block of ice.” 

{Freeze}. A common, basic-level spell that targets an object and freezes everything inside of it. Most of the time, it was used to create ice quickly, and many magicians in the Phoenix area use it to stay cool in the summer without using or having access to AC. As such a common spell, it is used through the single-word form rather than the longer form. 

I search a spell dictionary on my phone and write {Freeze}’s longer form out on a sheet of paper. It is longer than I expect, and I find that the means portion of the spell is rather vague. Only the results portion is particularly concrete: the spell drops the temperature of the target to –10 Celsius, enough to freeze almost anything. 

The first task is isolating the target. {Freeze} works on an area, not a specific object within that area. As such, the spell does not even have a target portion within its long form. Most spells don’t have it either; it's not necessary. 

I look at the bottle on the table at the front of the room. It looks like a plain 20 oz bottle, made of plastic rather than metal. I bet that he got it as part of a multipack from Walmart, though he has torn off the label. I can see his name scribbled in marker along the length of the bottle. 

I write down a simple target portion, but then I cross it out, realizing that the spell would target to the whole bottle, including the water. I scratch at the back of my neck. 

I try again. Freeze the bottle, not the water. Spells don’t make any distinction between types of materials, so I can’t just write Target: Plastic and be done with it. I think hard. I remember that the textbook did cover something about phases, but without my textbook on hand, I can’t just look it up. 

Amie is writing her own spell, but she is looking over at me, expecting to use mine to fulfill the assignment. 

I finally remember that spells can’t distinguish between materials but can target specific phases of matter. I scribble down a portion targeting solids, but then I realize my next obstacle: avoiding to freezing the table. I sigh. 

“You alright?” Amie asks. 

I nod. “Yeah. I’m just trying to figure out how to avoid freezing the table.” 

“The table?” 

“Yeah. I can tell the spell to freeze any solids in the target area, but I can’t figure out how to cause the bottle to be frozen to the tabletop.” 

“Ah,” Amie says. She leans back. “I wonder...” 

She gets to her feet and walks down to Redgrave, who is sitting on a single chair near the board. She talks to him for a couple of seconds, asking a question, and Redgrave answers. She nods and returns to her seat. “He said that we can do whatever we want to the bottle. It doesn’t have to stay on the table.” 

“So we can move it,” I say. “Can you hit a moving target?” 

She grins. “Of course. Who do you take me for?” 

I finish writing the spell and pass the page to her. “Come on,” she says, pulling me to my feet. I let her pull me down to the front of the room. She passes the page to Redgrave. He looks over the sheet, reading through the spell’s instructions. “Alright,” he says. “Let’s see what you can do.” 

I feel an intense stare on my back. I look over my shoulder, trying to spot the perpetrators. I find myself staring down the Neumann relatives. They glare at me, and I force myself to look away. 

Amie picks up the bottle. “Looks good,” she says softly. “Let’s go.” She passes me the bottle as she puts on her Focus. Already she is gathering magic, preparing to fuel the spell. It will have to be quick, since the spell has to hit the bottle while it is in midair, but I can’t throw it too high without causing uncertainty in its arc. “Go.” 

I toss the bottle into the air. 

She points at it. 

I spot a thin stream of magic go from her fingers to the bottle. 

Another stream of magic hits the bottle. 

I take a step back, even as the bottle begins to vibrate. 

Amie gasps. 

Redgrave gets up from the chair. 

The bottle explodes. 

I feel a shard of frozen plastic, hard and sharp as glass, slice into my cheek. 

I can see magic bubbling out of the broken bottle, racing towards me, two spells twisting and warping, becoming dangerously unstable. 

I realize that I’m standing in the danger zone. 

The spells hit me. 

The world goes black.


	2. Daniel 1

I punch the last of the thugs in the jaw, and the blow lays him out.

I take a deep breath, trying to calm down, and I reach up to swipe at a trail of sweat running down my cheek. I straighten up and look over at Ed. 

He has a man under one arm, his arm tight around the man’s throat. The man’s struggles are already weakening, and he soon falls unconscious. Ed lets him go; the man crumbles to the ground. Ed claps his hands together to clear the dust off his gloves. 

I reach down to dig through my target’s pockets. I pull out a wallet. I fish through the various cards there, ignoring the debit and credit cards to find his ID card. The Arizona license gives the man’s name and address, looking like a standard driver license, but when I flip the card to its back, I spot the emblem of House Lindhardt. My mouth turns sour. 

I take the card, dropping the rest of the wallet onto the man’s chest, and pass it to Ed, who has walked over to me. He looks it over, his face flushed but expressionless. “Should have known.” He tosses the card down onto the unconscious man.

We begin to walk down the street towards Main Street. Night has fallen over the town, but people walk along the sidewalk, enjoying the cooler air and open restaurants. We slip into the crowds and stroll towards the office. While it once hosted a bank and later government offices, House Roche had taken control of the building in the past decade. The copper-sided building serves as the base of operations for Roche activities and seat of power for the House in Mesa. 

The office is busy. The announcement of the peace treaty signing had caught everyone by surprise, and Patrick Roche saw the signing as an opportunity to rebuild the reputation of the House. Of course, House Lindhardt seems to be more interested in encroaching on House Roche’s sphere of influence.

We walk around the base of the building to the back, away from the road, to the entrance of the Lion’s Head bar. Other members of House Roche’s forces are already gathered there; we are late for the start of the festivities. I push through the door and claim a pair of stools at the bar. “Two of the finest,” I say, holding up two fingers.

The bartender looks over at me. He is a portly man with a thick beard but no mustache. I doubt he’s ever stepped out from behind the bar. “Geez, you two. First hint of a fight, and you just go charging in, Daniel.” He passes us a couple of beers. 

“Well, that’s Brawling Daniel for ya,” another man shouts. 

“A toast for Daniel!” a third man says.

“You were amazing today,” the bartender says.

Arms drape themselves over my shoulder and loosely around my neck. I feel a breath against my cheek. I turn in my seat, trying to look at Melanie. “Come on,” she croons, her lips moving against the skin of my neck. “Give me a kiss.”

I laugh. “That tickles. Knock it off.”

Ed watches up, his head perched on the edge of the bartop. “Give it up, Melanie,” he says. “Daniel’s got the hots for another lady right now.”

Melanie steps back. “Eh? Is that so? Tell me you’re joking,” she says, looking at me.

“Sorry. Maybe next time.”

Ed finishes his drink and sets the empty mug down. “Apparently she helped you out when you got mistaken for a groper? How’d that story go again?”

A wave of embarrassment goes through me. “She’s a dignified lady, just back from studying in New York. She’s stolen my heart! Just how it is.”

“And yet you foot the bill for every date? Sounds like a gold-digger to me.”

I pout at him. “It’s fine. She gives me a sweet kiss after, so I’m happy to do her bidding.”

He leans away from me, sighing. “I’m too suspicious of people, I guess. I wouldn’t be able to take it if I was a woman.”

I toss an arm over his shoulder. “And if you were a woman, I would smother you with gifts and kisses.”

He gently pushes me away, a faint smile on his face. “Good lord, you’re going to give people the wrong idea.” He grins. “How about a toast to our undying friendship?”

“Yeah.”

I manage to get back to my apartment just before 2 in the morning and pass out shortly afterwards. I wake around 10 in the morning. I stumble into the bathroom and begin to prepare for the day. I run a hand through my hair. I spot a sticky note on the mirror. It reads Date with Lisa 12p. The words shake me out of the last vestiges of sleep.

I finish getting ready, pulling on a pair of black slacks and a white dress shirt. I brush my hair back out of my face, and once I slick it back, I declare myself presentable. I get out the door just before 11.

I climb down the stairs, heading towards the lobby. I hum a tune to myself as I push through the door and step outside. The apartment complex is just off of Main Street, and I walk towards the light rail station at Center. I fish my wallet out and get the plastic Valley Metro card out. I press it against the sensor, hearing the faint beep as the RFID chip registers with the sensor and registers the fare to the card. I take a seat at the station and wait. 

A couple of ringing bells draws my attention up. One of the light rail trains, heading west, pulls into the station. I get to my feet as the doors open, and I climb into the car. There are a few other people on the train, but I’ve already passed the rush hour crowds so I climb three stairs and sit at the very bad of the car. 

The trip goes quickly and quietly, and I pass the time by eavesdropping on a pair of journeyman-level magicians discussing a more difficult spell than they were used to. I haven’t heard of the spell before, but they seem rather interested in the spell, so I continue to listen in.

“Now approaching McClintock Road and Apache Boulevard. Exit on the left.”

I get up and walk down to the stairs to the door. I grab onto the handle as the train comes to a stop, swaying with the faint motion of the train. The doors open shortly after the train stops, and I step out onto the station platform. 

My phone rings. I pull it out and spot Ed’s name on the screen. “Hey.”

“Where are you?”

“I’m meeting up with Lisa at Tempe Marketplace. What’s up?”

“Dormer had a job for us.”

“I’m already booked.”

He makes a noise. “Don’t take too long. We can’t put this off for too long.”

“Sorry, but I’ve already promised to spend the day with Lisa.”

He starts to argue, but I hang up on him. I catch the Orbit heading towards Tempe Marketplace. I look over the other passengers, but it doesn’t look like there are any Lindhardt associates on the bus. There aren’t any seats left, so I hold onto a pole just behind the driver. It’s a short ride, following McClintock past University and Rio Salado, and pulling into the parking lot at the light. The bus passes through two stop signs, turning right at the second, and follows the curving road around before turning right again to pull into the bus stop. I get off with about half of the other passengers.

I walk down the sidewalk to the main part of Tempe Marketplace. The sun beats down from overhead, and the expanse of pavement of the parking lot bakes me from below. I feel sweat beginning to pool at the base of my back and down my cheeks. I wait for a car to pass before crossing the road to a path between a couple of buildings. 

Mist falls over me, cooling the air. I spot magic crystals embedded into the lampposts, and I figure that the crystals are projecting {Cool} to help reduce the ambient temperature to a comfortable level. They give off a faint glow, and I feel the magic sliding over my skin. I wonder who made the crystals. I force the thought from my mind as I walk to the entrance of the restaurant.

It is a small place, just barely more than a hole in the wall, but there are a few people already standing at the counter. A display case, showing off the cakes that the shop is known for, stands to the right of the door, and four small tables stand to the left.

“Lisa!” I shout in excitement. 

The woman’s head snaps up. Lisa Butler glares at me. Her angelic, pale blond hair hangs loose over her shoulders, and her blue eyes sparkle with life. “Be quiet,” she says, her voice steady and sharp. “It’s rude to shout indoors.”

I walk across the store and take the seat in front of her. “Eh heh. Sorry. I just got done with a big job, so I’m on top of the world.”

She leans forward, resting her arms against the table. “Oh? And what sort of big job could a stocker have?”

“Well… I…” I glance at the menu hanging from the wall. “Never mind. Let’s order! The strawberry shortcake is out of this world!”

Her eyes narrow, but she says nothing. I take the opportunity to go to the register. I buy a whole cake, and the hostess places it on a plate and rings me up. She gives me two smaller plates and silverware. I take the cake back to the table. I cut a couple of pieces off and place them on the smaller plates. I pass one to Lisa who begins to eat. She smiles. “Delicious!” she says. “I didn’t know that a place like this existed. You must know a lot, being from around here.”

I grin. Good job, me! I take a bite of the cake. It’s sweeter than I expected, and the frosting is rather heavy, but all in all, the cake’s good. “That’s enough about me. Let’s hear about what you’ve been up to, Lisa.”

“Me?”

“Yeah! I wanna know what your life is like. You said that you were a businesswoman?”

She looks to the side before returning her attention to me. “Let’s see… I had a lunch meeting with the mafia.”

She says the words with such calm that I misunderstand the words for a moment. My mind goes blank, and I struggle to think and gather my thoughts. “Ma… Mafia? Wha…?”

She takes another bite. “Is it really that surprising?” She sets her fork down. “The Grant Family is incredibly powerful in the Valley.”

“I thought that you were in the magical artifact business.”

She looks at me. Her gaze is steady, and I tear my eyes away from her. “Don’t get the wrong idea. I’m not part of the mafia, but it’s dangerous to enter a new market without making contact with all of the relevant players in the area. I was just being polite.” She reaches for a glass of water and takes a sip.

“What about House Roche?”

“House Roche?”

I nod. “House Roche controls Mesa, so I would think that they would be important.”

She sighs. “I don’t know. The members of the House itself are fine people, but the groups under them… The Association is a place where black sheep and dropouts gather. They’ll never admit that, though, and would rather throw their weight around, intimidating people. The worst sort of lowlife. The Grant family mafia are not much better.”

I feel my hands clenching into fists and force myself to relax. I can’t tell her. I can’t tell her that I work in that Association. I can’t let her know.

“How do you manage to talk to scary folks like that then? Didn’t they… try to intimidate you?” I let the line of thought fall away. “I know! Despite my looks, I’m pretty reliable in a pinch. If anything happens, just come to me and I’ll straighten it out.”

She holds her hand up. “No thank you. I don’t need a man to come clean up my mistakes. I’m not so weak.”  
I gag, realizing my mistake. I raise my hands. “I didn’t mean it like that.”

She giggles. “Just teasing. Thank you for caring so much.” She smiles at me. “I’m just bad at accepting kindness at face value. It’s something I’m working on.”

I reach up and scratch the back of my head, nervousness making my arms ache. I sigh.

We finish eating and head out into the early afternoon sun. I check my watch. It’s only about 1 in the afternoon, a little early for the movie at 1:45. The walk to the movie theater is not long, so there’s really no rush. With the misters and magic crystals, the temperature is far lower along the sidewalk than normal. We decide to do a little bit of window shopping. 

Shouting draws my attention while we walk past a bar. A couple of men are throwing punches at each other, and the sight gets my blood going. “What’s going on?” Lisa asks.

“A brawl between drunks. A bit rare to see in this area…” 

I gasp, a thought coming to mind. _This is my chance to show her how handy I am in a fight! Just watch me, Lisa!_

I take a step forward.

“Violence is so despicable,” Lisa says.

I stop.

“Just watching it makes me nauseous. Right?”

I struggle to force a smile to my face. “Y… Yeah.”

She turns and begins to walk away from the brawl. I take a look back at the brawl before turning to follow her. “There are three types of people I hate. The first: thugs. The second: violent people.”

She pauses. “The third?” I ask, though I get the feeling that I already know the answer. 

“Violent thugs. They should all just go die.”

_Knew it._

I manage to give a weak laugh.

She turns to face me. “It’s good that you’re not like that though. I would have hated you forever if you had gotten excited by that brawl and joined into the fray.”

I nod. 

“Isn’t that Daniel?” someone nearby asks. 

I stiffen but don’t say anything. Someone else answers the man. “No way. Daniel would have jumped feet-first into that fight.”

_Absolutely correct. Wrong guy. Stop staring at me! Ah! I just want to knock their heads together…_

Lisa glances at me, and the growing anger just dies away. I take a deep breath. _No. I have to be prepared for this._

_It’s just what happens when someone like me, coming from the darkness, falls in love with a girl from the light._


	3. Landyn 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Landyn chases David Crane through the city of Chicago as Crane prepares to commit a massacre.

We tear across Jackson Boulevard, heading north on State Street. The skyscrapers block out the sunlight, and the groups of people moving through the deep shadows make it difficult to track my target. It’s only the thin thread of red magic that allows me to continue the chase. 

David Crane glances over his shoulder at me. His eyes widen and then narrow in anger. He takes a moment to spin, a spell already at the ready, and fire it at me. A police baton serves as his Focus, and he brandishes it with a steady hand. 

I skid to a stop. I raise my hand, and my Focus, a band of metal, warms up around my wrist as I cast a {Barrier} spell. The two spells clash. They twist around each other, the magics tearing at each other, before misfiring.

The misfire knocks down everyone in the area. I crash into a parked city vehicle, denting in the side of the truck. Other pedestrians are knocked into the sides of the buildings or onto the sidewalk. Crane himself is thrown nearly 10 feet further down the street. 

He scrambles to his feet. I push against the side of the vehicle, getting to my feet myself. He turns and starts running down the street again. I chase after him, leaving the crowd of people behind. 

“You’re not going to provide aid?” Jenn asks, her voice coming from the piece in my ear.

“And let this bastard get away? Not a chance. Let the police take care of them.”

We cross Monroe Street, going against the light. Car horns start blaring, and I run into the front quarter panel of a car that stopped in the middle of the crosswalk. The driver lays on the horn. I glare at them and slap the hood before continuing the chase.

I catch a glimpse of blue magic moving through the air. Jenn is getting ahead of Crane, though she is too high to really interfere safely. She clings to the side of buildings using a modified {Cling} spell, which allows her to easily detach from the stone walls.

I turn my attention back to Crane. He weaves in and out of the crowds milling around the entrance of the Target store at the corner, and for a moment I think that he has slipped into the store. The trail of magic tells me otherwise, and we dodge around cars as we run across Madison Street. 

Crane prepares another spell. I draw a knife, engraved with two spells, and throw it at the wall above the entrance to the Express fashion shop. The {Warp} spell triggers as soon as the blade sinks into the stone using a {Decay} spell. The magic wraps around me and rips me up from the sidewalk. I narrowly avoid Crane’s spell.

My disappearance disorients Crane. I use the opportunity to wrench the knife free and dive down at Crane. He notices me and tries to jump out of the way, but my knife catches him down the upper arm. The blade tears through the leather coat and thick shirt easily. He gasps, pulling away, but I push my advantage. I trip him up with a sweep of his feet, and I pull on his wrist to knock him further off balance. 

He retaliates, slamming the baton into the side of my thigh. Pain flares up, and it nearly causes my vision to go black. I do let go of him though, and he pushes me away. I barely manage to intercept his spell, but the misfire knocks me back, putting more space between us. 

I struggle to my feet. Pain flares up my leg, muscle protesting angrily, and I feel bruised all over. My stores of magic are beginning to run low, even with the slight amount coming from the busy road to my left. 

I spot Jenn racing after Crane. She moves smoothly through the air. “You alright?” she asks. 

“I’m fine. Just needed to catch my breath.” I start running down the street again. Crane is already past Washington Street, and his back is fading into the crowd. I charge across the street. The trail is still there, floating into the air, and I follow it through the crowds. Crane makes his way across Randolph Street and Benton Place before I can catch up.

“We’re getting close to the river.”

I bite my lip. The Chicago River. A landmark working its way through town, with dozens of bridges crossing over it. An impressive river feeding into Lake Michigan, it is a deadline threatening to wash away the tracking spell.

Only two major roads, Lake Street and Wacker Drive, stand between us and the river. If Crane can get to the river, he’ll have a chance to slip into the crowd or use a disguising spell to hide with no way to track him.   
He would be free to commit his crimes again.

“Crane!” I shout. The shout draws the attention of everyone on the sidewalk. I raise my hand, drawing on my dwindling magic. People shout in surprise and dive out of the way. I cast {Freeze}. Crane ducks away from the spell, and it strikes the sidewalk behind him. A patch of ice spreads across the concrete, making passage difficult for the next few minutes.

Crane launches a spell at me. I dodge the spell, trying to make my way towards him. The spell goes wild, ricocheting off the concrete and striking the low-hanging sign of the Chicago Theatre. Glass rains down on me and I feel some shards cutting into my cheek and shoulders. People scream, trying to take cover from the barrage of spells.

I duck behind the entrance to the subway station. A spell skips off the sidewalk, shattering the concrete. I raise my hand to shield my face from the fragments. I lean over to look around the side of the station. I spot Crane running from me.

“Fuck!” I scramble out from behind cover and chase after him. We pass under the El station as we cross Lake Street. My eyes struggle to make the transition from light to dark to light again, and I’m blind for a second with each change. 

I nearly run head-first into another of Crane’s spell. I duck away from it, stumbling slightly. This spell is weaker than the rest. _He must be getting tired._ The thought gives me a burst of strength.

I fire off a spell. Crane, exhausted from the steady use of magic, can’t dodge in time, and the spell hits him square in the chest. It knocks him down to the ground. The fall leaves him winded. 

I rush forward, taking advantage of the chance. We are only about 20 feet apart, the closest we’ve been since the attack that wounded his arm earlier. I can’t let this opportunity to pass.

I spot Jenn jumping down. She lands a couple of feet away from Crane. He manages to get to his feet just as she lands, and he slams the baton into her left leg. She gasps but continues standing and launches a flurry of attacks at him. He uses the baton to block some of them, but she does manage to break through, slamming her fists into his wounded arm. Crane cracks her across the leg again. She falls to one knee, and before she can recover, he smashes her in the side of the head. She collapses to the ground as Crane takes off again. 

She is already moving as I race past her. “Go! Go!” she shouts at me.

Crane crosses Wacker. He rushes past the tower monitoring river traffic. The trail of magic begins to flicker and fade as the magic of the river eats at the spell. I feel the natural magic beginning to seep into me, though it doesn’t little more than ease my exhaustion slightly. 

I raise my hand. I’ve got just enough magic to case one more spell. {Bind} flies at Crane. It hits him in the back of one leg, and magical tethers tie him to the ground. He falls hard. The magic is already falling apart, but I’m close enough to grab him. 

I pin Crane to the ground with a knee to the small of his back and wrench his arms back. I snap a pair of enchanted cuffs around his wrists before I wrestle him to his feet. He screams in pain as I press on the injury. “Come on, you son of a bitch.”

I guide him back towards Wacker. He walks slowly; {Bind} must have pull something in his leg. He must also be almost completely drained of magic, and the cuffs suppress the rest. 

“You don’t know what you’re doing, Crownsguard,” Crane says. “You and I are just a small part of something so much bigger than you can imagine.”

“Yeah? Is that what you call planning to commit a massacre?”

“A necessary sacrifice to guide us to the future. A necessary sacrifice to bring the truth of the First Sin out into the open.”

My grip on his arm tightens. “What? You think that you’re successor to the Scholars? You want to carry on their rotten, damnable work?”

Crane looks at me. His eyes burn into mine. “Do you really think that the Scholars are gone?”

My anger rises, and I growl at him. “What are you saying?”

Before Crane can answer me, a barrage of spells rain down on us. The spells smash into the ground, sending up a cloud of pulverized pavement. The dust blinds me, and as I take a breath, the dust begins to choke me. I feel Crane being pulled out of my grasp. “Hey!” I shout, struggling to gag past the dust in my throat. I struggle towards the sound of people moving. 

Someone in the dust shoves against me. I feel myself slam into the railing of the bridge. I grab onto it with both hands, but the person shoves me once, twice more, and I find myself tipping over the top of the railing.

I hit the surface of the water. It feels like slamming into a brick wall, and the gasp of pain draws in a breath of water. 

I begin to drown.


End file.
